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Case Study: “The Drunken Whaler” for the Dishonored gameplay trailer |
Challenge: Creating an ominous rendition of “The Drunken Sailor” sea shanty for the Dishonored gameplay trailer, which was unveiled prior to the 2012 Electronic Entertainment Expo (E3) in June.
Results: Since the Dishonored trailer
launched, it has received more than 850,000 views on YouTube and won
Machinima’s “Best Trailer” award. Due to the popularity of the
trailer’s music, COPILOT and publisher Bethesda Softworks recently
announced a remix contest and have released the full-length version of the song for free on the Bethesda blog.
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“When
we came up with the idea for ‘The Drunken Whaler,’ it was both
exciting and nerve-racking,” says Regi Jacob, Bethesda Softworks Senior
Brand Manager. “You only get one shot to distinguish your game from
all the others at E3. Ravi Krishnaswami and Jason Menkes, COPILOT
Partners, immediately grasped what we were trying to accomplish and
created something truly chilling – and that ultimately captured the tone
of the game, as well as gamers’ imaginations. Their ability to pull the
song together was impressive, but the speed at which it happened was
phenomenal. They go out of their way to be collaborative and have a
knack for understanding what you’re looking for and pinpointing what
works.”
“COPILOT's
distinctive re-imagining of ‘Drunken Sailor’ was nothing short of
beautiful,” says Charles Bae, Chief Creative Office/Partner at Rokkan,
the full-service creative agency behind the game's advertising campaign.
“It helped make Dishonored's E3 trailer a memorable experience for both the fans and the Dishonored
brand. It was a challenging task, and their studio understood right
away the mood and goals we were trying to accomplish with the trailer.
Troll YouTube for covers of ‘Drunken Sailor’ and I guarantee this is the
best contemporary version in existence. COPILOT gets it.”
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The
new lyrics for “The Drunken Whaler” are darker than the original song,
so many of the discussions revolved around which verses would best
inspire Bethesda's editor, Salinee Goldenberg, to craft a three-minute
story from the gameplay footage. The group decided on using the voices
of ordinary children – rather than a professional youth choir – to
achieve a dark, haunting quality to the music. This created an
interesting juxtaposition between the innocence of the voices and the
brutality in the gameplay footage.
COPILOT
produced a number of versions in multiple tempos so they could really
explore how the song should feel, and where the lyrics would fall in the
final piece. After debating a variety of instrumental approaches to the
arrangement, COPILOT built a unique ensemble of instruments including
the hurdy-gurdy, violins bowed behind their bridges, and distorted,
detuned guitars. During a hands-on studio session with Jacob and Bae,
the team hammered out the final musical elements. This included a
recording of the “whaler stomp” in which the entire assembled team
stomped on wooden boards to create a visceral pulse that suited the
creepy violence in the track.
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“The
biggest challenge was casting the chorus of child singers,” explains
Menkes. “We initially reached out to public schools around New York,
including an elementary school where my mother is assistant principal.
We quickly realized that it was going to be difficult to get permission
from parents to allow their kids to sing about slit throats, rusty
cleavers, and hungry rats. In the end, we crafted a choir from
child actors who could carry a tune, adult singers who impersonate young
voices, and the children of our very understanding family and friends.”
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